Xing Tai Canteen, Huanghe Road, Shanghai

I hope I got the name of this place correct - it was the best that I could figure out using nciku. I wasn't specifically planning to come to this shop either (137 Huanghe Road, 6372-5871). But the hotel's concierge mentioned that this street was well-known for having a lot of local food, so I had the cabbie take me to the street to see what I could find.

OK, there was something I was specifically looking for...or two. They were two dishes that I immediately associate with Shanghai food that aren't commonly available anywhere else (so that means *not* xiao long bao nor sheng jian bao). It was that white pepper eel dish as well as drunken prawns, and this shop had them. So I sat myself down and ordered exactly those two items.

While it might not look too appetizing in the photo, the former came out with that white pepper fragrance emanating off of these delicate strips of mildly sweet eel - I gobbled this plate up in seconds with a bowl of rice. The raw prawns, however, were bigger than I was expecting, as I had smaller river shrimp the first time I was up here. Having to peel these bigger guys made it less convenient to eat.